Background

Musical keys have always been associated with emotional or qualitative characteristics. One of the most widely spread descriptions of such characteristics was produced by Christian Schubart in his work Ideen zu einer Aesthetik der Tonkunst in 1806. I wanted to see what keys did Tame Impala and Jimi Hendrix use: was there a key that they used very often? If so, what did they want to convey through that? I will be evaluating using Shubart’s work.

Tame Impala

Tame Impala favored using the C major key throughout his entire discography, with D# (Eb) major and G major coming in second and third. The C major is known to resemble a character’s innocence and freedom from burden; the D# major is related to love and conversation with God; and, the G major represents gentleness and peacefulness. It seems like Tame Impala’s music triggers the audience’s desire to stay pure and gentle, and their overwhelming use of the C major taps into their listeners’ inner-selves. This also correlates with the genre of psychedelic rock because the use of psychedelics is linked to an increasing sense of the mind and opens up the user to themselves.

Tame Impala: Histogram

Jimi Hendrix

Jimi Hendrix uses two main keys throughout his entire discography: the C# (Db) major and the G# (Ab) major. The C# major represents grief and sadness, and it brings out unusual characters and feelings. Similarly, the G# major is associated with death and grave. What’s interesting is that these two keys are not commonly used in popular music; however, it is very clear that Hendrix still favors these two keys over the others as there is a clear distinction between the frequency of C# and G# and the remaining keys. These characteristics contribute to the genre of psychedelic rock because the combination of the use of two unusual keys, as well as the negative feelings that they introduce to the audience, was able to contribute to a tonal ambiguity. As a result, Hendrix was able to produce a dreamlike quality in his music that is characteristic of the psychedelic genre.

Jimi Hendrix: Histogram

“The Less I Know The Better” Analysis

The chromagram for Tame Impala’s top hit, “The Less I Know The Better”, is computed using the Euclidean distance, which allows it to capture the similarities between two chroma vectors. It is particularly interesting because there is evidence for a wide range of pitch distribution as well as the consistent use of certain chords throughout the entire song. For example, pitches E and C# are repeatedly used in alternating intervals, with each segment lasting about 5 seconds. Pitches B and D# also occur in the same way, but with each segment lasting about 2 seconds. These alternating sequences of pitches indicate the complex makeup of “The Less I Know The better”, as the song is composed of several layers of sounds: the repetition of bassline, the use of dreamy guitar, as well as the variations of synth parts.

“The Buring of the Midnight Lamp” Analysis

The chromagram for Jimi Hendrix’s top hit, “The Burning of the Midnight Lamp”, is also computed with Euclidean distance. Compared to “The Less I Know The Better”, this chromagram displays much less variation across the use of pitches. Jimi Hendrix mostly focused on pitches F, E, D, and C; the overlap of segments of these pitches suggest that he tried to focus on harmony rather than alternating sequences of instruments. This is also supported by instances where magnitudes of these pitches spike together. For example, around 70sec and 150sec, pitches F and C both show a high magnitude that last about 5-7 seconds. They also correspond to the beginning of the two intense guitar solos during the song, showing how much Hendrix places emphasis on creating harmonies between the drums and the guitar.

Background

The two self-similarity matrices on the left are each summarized at the bar level and illustrate pitch- and timbre-based self-similarity within the top hits of the two artists.

“The Less I Know The Better” Analysis

In the chroma-based self-similarity matrix for “The Less I Know The Better’, there are few clear parallel diagonal lines; instead, it mostly presents a checkerboard composed of small blocks. The checkerboard means that there are a lot of repeating notes or motifs that happen throughout the entire song, and its composition of small blocks means that these repetitive themes are fairly short and often change quickly and frequently, creating a complex harmonic texture. This corresponds to the chord sequence that”The Less I Know The Better” uses – a four-note pattern that is frequently heard throughout the verse section of the song. It is composed of the chords Bm, E, G, and F#, and it resembles the signature guitar riff. Starting from around 70sec and 145sec, we can see the start of a new section of small blocks, and these represent the chorus parts of the song. They use a slightly different four-note pattern with chords Bm, F#, G, F#, hence creating a dividing line in the matrix.

In the timbre-based self-similarity matrix, we can see a few yellow lines that cross throughout the entire song, which resemble a sudden change in timbre. One of the most notable ones happens during the first 10 seconds, and this actually represents the guitar solo at the beginning of the song that is not seen anywhere else in the rest of the song. There are also yellow lines throughout the matrix that divide the verse sections from the chorus sections, such as at 70sec and 100sec, and these indicate short periods of time where vocals disappear and pure instruments make up the bridge between the two sections.

“The Burning of the Midnight Lamp” Analysis

In the chroma-based self-similarity matrix for “The Burning of the Midnight Lamp”, there are a few sections with clear parallel diagonal lines that represent repeating motives. For example, the section from 30sec to 60sec is repeated again from 70sec to 100sec and 150sec to 180sec. This indicates the verse sections which are repeated 3 times throughout the entire song. The bright lines that separate these sections that last from 60sec to 70sec and 145sec to 155sec represent the bridge with no vocals; however, these bridges are different every time and are therefore not homogeneous.

In the timbre-based self-similarity matrix, there is obvious yellow line that occurs at 60sec to 65sec that is not seen anywhere else in the rest of the graph. This significant change in timbre is the bridge between the first chorus and the second bridge, where there are only vocals and no instruments. This is not repeated anywhere throughout the rest of the song; hence, the yellow line is very prominent. The second, fainter yellow line occurs after the second chorus around 110sec. This is the bridge that allows Hendrix to transition from traditional rock to more psychedelic guitar riffs that produce more distorted sounds. It is composed of a very short period of no instruments and is then followed by an intense arrangements of instruments. This contributes to building up the tension and energy for the last sections of the song.

“The Less I know The Better” Analysis

The chordogram generated to the right is based off of individual sections in “The Less I Know The Better”, and it is interesting to see the differences in chords used for every part of the song. The song starts off with a repeated guitar riff, using chords such as F, G, and Eb. It then transitions to the verse sections, where the use of G minor, F, Bb major and D minor became more prominent. This also contributes to a more melancholy section, where the song is more introspective. At 70sec, the song transitions to the chorus section, where we see a drastic change in the chords used. Eb major is still used, but the distribution of chords used becomes more even, creating a sense of harmony. This pattern of verse section and chorus section repeats again, before the song ends with an outro that uses chords similar to the verse section.

“The Burning of the Midnight Lamp” Analysis

The chordogram to the right is also based off of individual sections in “The Burning of the Midnight Lamp”, and it features a complex and diverse set of chord progressions that help to create the signature psychedelic and otherworldly sound. It opens with a signature guitar riff that uses chords D# minor, F# minor, and Gb major, thus creating a dreamy and mysterious atmosphere. As it transitions into the verse section at 25sec, the chord distributions even out, before following by the chorus section which focuses on A major and A minor to create a catchy and upbeat chord progression. This pattern continues until 140sec, where D# minor, B major, and G# minor come into play again to support the guitar riff. Overall, “The Burning of the Midnight Lamp” features a wide range of chord progressions that help to create a sense of tension and release.

“The Less I Know The Better”

“The Burning of the Midnight Lamp”

“The Less I Know The Better” Analysis

“The Less I Know The Better” has a steady and consistent tempo throughout the song, as the tempogram on the right has a relatively straight bright line throughout the entire song. Spotify estimates the tempo to be around 116-118 BPM, which is moderate to slightly fast. As it can be seen from the tempogram, it features a consistent beat with drums, bass, and various electronic and acoustic instruments adding layers to the rhythm. There are some slight variations in the rhythmic patterns throughout the song, such as at around 40sec, 100sec, and 150sec, where very faint vertical yellow lines can be seen. They indicate the short bridges that connect two verse sections and involve a slight variation in the use of instruments. For example, at 100sec, an extra drum beat is added. At 150sec, the drums and bass drop out briefly to create a break, then come back in a more intense rhythm. These sections are used to build up the tension in the song and to contribute to the creation of a groove; however, since their main purpose is not to change the tempo, “The Less I Know The Better” still maintains a relatively consisten tempo throughout the entire song.

“The Burning of the Midnight Lamp” Analysis

“The Burning of the Midnight Lamp” does not have a steady and consistent tempo, unlike “The Less I Know The Better”. The tempograms depicts the general tempo to be within the range of 140 to 160 BPM; however, there are a lot of variations within the rhythmic pattern for every section. The song begins with a slow, steady drum beat for the first guitar riff, with the tempo at about 140 BPM. During the verse sections, however, the tempo speeds up and continues doing so as the guitar riff becomes more and more intense until it reaches about 155 BPM. Then, the bridge between two verse sections happen, dropping the tempo back to 140 BPM. This trend occurs two more times. However, the tempogram begins to show more and more scattered yellow areas as the song goes on, perhaps due to the increasingly complex composition of instruments that are added to build up the climax of the song. The last 20-30sec of the song is the most prominent guitar riff, and it is also where the tempogram shows a lot of variations in its activity. This is most likely due to Spotify listening to a variety of different instruments, hence creating a complex and diverse section of the tempo.

Analysis

I also wanted to compare Tame Impala and Jimi Hendrix’s albums by using models to see how they would be grouped together. Therefore, I created a dendrogram using complete linking on a playlist that combined Currents and Electric Ladyland to identify possible clusters as well as possible outliers.

As one can see in the graph to the right, there are clearly two outliers that do not belong to any of the clusters: “Gossip” by Tame Impala and “Moon, Turn the Tides… Gently Gently Away” by Jimi Hendrix. This is because both are purely instrumental with no speech involved, and they both are experimental tracks that involves more electronic activity to create a distinct and otherworldly atmosphere. “Gossip” is a track that stands out from the other songs on the playlist because it is a short and dreamy interlude with no discernible lyrics, while the other songs on the playlist are either upbeat or have distinct vocal melodies and lyrics. It also uses a lot of reverb and panning to drag out the spaciousness in its atmosphere. On the other hand, “Moon, Turn the Tides…Gently Gently Away” is a psychedelic instrumental track that stands out because it is much longer and more experimental than the other tracks. The song is over 12 minutes long and features extensive use of distortion and feedback, creating a more chaotic and improvisational sound than the other songs on the playlist. It also features Jimi Hendrix’s guitar riffs that drag the audience into another world.

The hierarchical clustering is interesting to me because the rest of the songs basically all belong to one cluster after excluding the two outliers. This can be see if you count three levels from the top of the tree – at the third level, the cluster forms includes all of the songs except for “Gossip” and “Moon, Turn the Tides… Gently Gently Away”. Looking at the heatmap, most of the songs are very similar across all attributes according to values calculated by Spotify. The only two songs that have significant different values are the two outliers that I have discussed, further showing how they might be different from the rest of the songs. In addition, the huge cluster of the rest of the playlist also shows that Spotify would consider these two albums as fairly similar to each other and would classify them together.

Dendrogram

Heatmap

Compare and Contrast

As we are nearing the end of this corpus, I just wanted to do a quick recap of everything that I’ve covered and analyze the similarities and differences between the two artists. In general, Tame Impala and Jimi Hendrix belong to the same category of psychedelic rock; as we can see from using clustering and classification methods to generate dendrograms and heatmaps, the majority of the songs in their two albums are on a par with each other. They also have generally similar tempo, valence, and energy values, with Electric Ladyland having a slower tempo.As we dove deeper, we can see elements that contributed to the individual psychedelic components of the songs. Using the key histograms, we see that both artists chose keys that would trigger a certain feeling in their audience to contribute to the dream-like qualities surrounding their music.

When I analyzed their top tracks, “The Less I Know The Better” and “The Burning of the Midnight Lamp”, I began to see slight differences in how they carry out their music. From the chromagrams and self-similarity matrices, I can tell that “The Less I Know The Better” put a lot of emphasis on the repetition of a four-chord sequence throughout the entire song. His psychedelic qualities came from stacking layers of other instruments and lyrics on top of that – the bassline, the use of guitar, and variations of synth parts. “The Less I Know The Better” also maintained a steady tempo throughout the entire song in addition to the consistent chord patterns. This shows that the song put a lot of emphasis on creating harmony between various layers as well as creating a more straightforward progression with a few unexpected twists.

On the other hand, “The Burning of the Midnight Lamp” is quite the opposite. Jimi Hendrix focused a lot on producing a complex and unpredictable series of changes throughout the song. This includes a wide range of chord progressions, tempos, and insertions of different guitar riffs between every section. Jimi Hendrix not only wants to keep his fans on their toes, but he also wants them to listen to the song as if it was a story. Although there were harmonies, there was more emphasis on using guitar to bring out the classical rock in the song. This results in a more raw and organic feel with a lot of experimentation in the studio, rather than “The Less I Know The Better”’s polished and electronic atmosphere. As a result, it’s evident that these two top hits bring out different sides of psychedelic rock.

Ending Thoughts

Completing this corpus has allowed me to learn so much, from technical knowledge in musicology to using R to build a markdown page. Before this class, I have never touched anything in musicology; while I listen to music on a daily basis, I never had the chance to dive into the theoretical parts of it and understand what makes up the composition of music. I started this class with 0 knowledge and didn’t even know the difference between chords and keys. However, I knew that I wanted to analyze my favorite genre, psychedelic rock, and understand the differences between two of my favorite artists.

Creating this corpus has taught me how to extract specific information from some of my favorite songs. For example, I learned that the reason that “The Less I Know The Better” is so mesmerizing is because of its repetition of the same four chords as well as how many layers of instruments it has to create the harmony. On the other hand, “The Burning of the Midnight Lamp” is less organized, and it’s meant to use its guitar riffs to drag its audience into the other world.

These conclusions can benefit any other person that wants to learn about the difference between the two songs or the two albums analyzed. Although it does not cover the artists in general, it can help others learn about what exactly differs between the two songs, thus offering insight to allow them to start their own research. Or, it can also provide information about the composition of either of the two songs, as I’ve analyzed them in this corpus.

Overall, I really enjoyed creating this project from scratch, and I can bring these skills to future projects if I want to analyze some of my other favorite songs!